Monday, October 29, 2012

Philippines with least gender disparity in Asia

The
Philippines still leads Asian countries in reducing inequality between
men and women, according to the 2012 Global Gender Gap rankings of the
World Economic Forum (WEF).The report showed the Philippines
remained among the top 10 with the least gender disparity. It had an
overall score of 0.7757, to rank eighth out of 135 countries, unchanged
from the previous year.

Nordic countries Iceland, Finland,
Norway and Sweden led the world, having closed their gender gaps by
over 80 per cent. Other countries in the top 10 are Ireland (5th), New
Zealand (6th), Denmark (7th), Nicaragua (9th) and Switzerland (10th).

“The key for the future of any country
and any institution is the capability to attract the best talents,”
Klaus Schwab, WEF founder and chair, said in a statement.

“In the future, talent will be more
important than capital or anything else. To develop the gender
dimension is not just a question of equality; it is the entry card to
succeed and prosper in an ever more competitive world,” he added.

The annual survey ranks countries on
their ability to close gender gap in four categories namely educational
attainment, health and survival, economic participation and opportunity
and political empowerment. The scores range between 1 (equality) and 0
(inequality).

The Philippines got the perfect score of
1 to rank first (tied with 19 countries) in educational attainment
which captures the ratios of women to men in primary, secondary, and
tertiary levels of education.

With a score of 0.9796, the Philippines
also grabbed the top spot (tied with 31 countries) in health and
survival which gives an overview of the differences between women’s and
men’s health.

Further, the Philippines was among the
top 20 in the two other categories with a score of 0.7719 (17th) in
economic participation and opportunity and 0.3515 (14th) in political
empowerment.

“The Philippines is the only country in
Asia this year to have closed the gender gap in both education and
health,” the report said adding it had the highest rank among Asian
countries.The country’s overall ranking bested
Association of Southeast Asian Nations neighbours Singapore (55th),
Thailand (65th), Vietnam (66th), Brunei Darussalam (75th), Indonesia
(97th), Malaysia (100th) and Cambodia (103rd).

Meanwhile, global trends showed that the
135 countries covered in the report, representing over 90 per cent of
the world’s population, have closed almost 96 per cent of the gender
gap in health and nearly 93 per cent of the gender gap in educational
attainment.

However, the gap between women and men
in economic participation and political empowerment remains wide. Only
60 per cent of the gap in economic outcomes and 20 per cent of the gap
in political outcomes have been closed, the report said.

Saadia Zahidi, head of the forum’s women
leaders and gender parity programme noted that six of the top 10
countries in the 2012 WEF Global Competitiveness Index were in the top
20 of the Global Gender Gap Index.

These countries are Switzerland, Finland, Sweden, Netherlands, Germany and United Kingdom.

“This shows the imperative for countries
that have already invested in the health and education of women to
address the economic and political realms, and for those that have not
to do so before their economies fall further behind,” Zahidi said.